Chapter Twenty-One: From Porcelain, to Ivory, to Steel
He had been gone for a long time, almost an hour. He and the red-haired Wildling woman. Sansa continued to incline her head towards the forest, attune and listening. She had not wanted to do it; she had told herself that she had not cared one dry fuck where he had gone, if he had fallen off a ravine somewhere (she didn't, truly), but even she knew such denial could not be upheld for so long. Try as she might, she could not quell this curiosity.
She had worn her hair loose and unbound, remembering how Jon's eyes darkened and ignited whenever he allowed his eyes to feast on her. Even in her unconscious state after the abduction, Sansa remembered the sensation of his hands upon her hair. It was a strange thing...She had never imagined one with such large and calloused hands capable of gentleness.
The proffered furs were not such a tedious or difficult task, as she had worn men's clothing before as she sparred with Rob and Arya back home. Although the epitome of a lady, Sansa was not so far removed that she would forgo convenience for luxury. Besides, it was for a purpose, all of it.
"He had been watching you, She-Wolf." Muirgayne observed quietly, all the while watching the campfire flames flicker and dance. Sansa blinked, startled. When had she returned? The last time Muirgayne had spoken with her, it was to inform her that she was to tuck her youngest in for the night. Little Kiva barely keeping her eyes open during the festivities, her dark curls resting and tucked upon Tormund's shoulder.
Sansa turned, facing Muirgayne fully. Throughout the feast, Sansa noticed something different. Jon looked tortured, conflicted. Tormund had always japed on Jon's moroseness and intensity. Yet this night...He seemed persecuted. Was it because of her? Sansa dared to hope.
"Truly? It seemed the hunting knife held more interest than I." Sansa stopped then, refusing to divulge more. Muirgayne was sharp, keen. In the day that Sansa had met her, she had already proven to not suffer fools. Sansa could not risk letting her in on her plans of seduction and escape. No, better to play the distressed lady, helpless and passive, than allow her or anyone else to let on. Besides, this was Sansa's game to play and these were her chess pieces to manipulate and move; she was far from helpless.
"You did not see what I saw, Lady Wolf. He was looking on you how a dog eyes a bone. 'Tis strange, he's never looked on a woman the way he looks at you, with such longing. Not even with Ygritte."
Sansa trembled, the involuntary jolt surging down her spine. Although she was aware of the Wildling's lusts, it was a curious thing to hear its confirmation from someone else's lips-someone who knew Jon and was something akin to a friend. Good. A small, secret smile threatened to break through and Sansa fought to carefully school her features. Not now, she could not break now.
"Your Wolf Prince is not in love with me. I am but a novelty to him. He's just upset because I refuse his attentions." That so much was true. Sansa believed that had she not been withholding her affections from him and had given herself freely-like he wanted and desired-she would have already been discarded, like scraps to the furnace.
She refused. In order to get what she wanted, Sansa had to play her hand carefully. So far, she held the winning cards. Let him look, that secretive voice whispered deliciously. Let him like what he sees.
"Tell me about Ygritte, Muirgayne." Although Sansa did not recall Jon's heated, furtive gaze, she did remember Ygritte's eyes-cold, calculating, and burning. While Ramsay's eyes were maniacal and apathetic, Ygritte's were cruel and empty, like frozen, glacial lakes. Throughout the duration of the feast, they had narrowed and pinned Sansa down, as though she were some loathsome, abhorrent pestilence she wanted to rid the world of. Sansa stared back, unintimidated.
Since when were wolves afraid of balding sheep?
Muirgayne spat the ground, a hard gleam in her eye. "Cunt. You best keep away from that one. She traverses the evil road. She is a jealous, frothing mad bitch. Any woman that comes within a league of Jon Snow is made her enemy."
Sansa stilled, listening in rapt fascination. Aunt Lysa had once told her to pay close attention, that everything that is seen has already been visited once before. She had been here before-this was Ramsay Bolton all over again.
Last year, when Sansa had been five and ten,and the wedding preparations had been underway, she and her elder brother, Rob, had visited the Dreadfort, accompanied by their Lord Father, to visit Roose and his newly legitimized son. "Bastard." Rob sneered the word underneath his breath, out of their father's hearing. The word was vile, base. An unwanted demarcation and blight against a person's nature.
Sansa loathed the word, believed the castigation unfair and permanent. Yet upon her initial meeting with the Bolton lordling, no adjective could better describe the monster hidden behind his innocent smiles and saccharine courtesies. It was a stable boy that revealed the depravity lurking beneath. The young man's sole transgression was to let his eyes linger a tad too long on Sansa's form as she dismounted from her mare. Sansa had dismissed the slight, bestowing the stable lad-Luc-with a small smile of gratitude as he helped her off her beast.
Yet, Ramsay singled in on Luc, like a seizing, virulent dog, and backhanded the defenseless servant so severely it had broken his nose, the crimson river freely flowing from the orifice. Sansa had been horrified, outraged; Ned angry yet silent. Roose, apathetic and indifferent. Father had inquired on the lad soon after, the very least he could do. He had been dismayed to learn that Luc had disappeared into the night soon after the unfortunate incident, his putrefied and disarticulated remains spread about the forested floor.
Roose had asserted it had been an accident, the unfortunate result of a hunting accident gone awry; that he had been drunk and fallen off his horse and the beasts of the forest had ravished him. Yet Sansa knew the truth. He had died because of jealousy. Because of misconstrued actions. Envy truly was the death of all…
"You forget that I had been kidnapped from my home and taken against my will to the ends of the earth. I have no family, no soldiers to fight for me, and yet here I stand. I am not one to scare easily."
Muirgayne chuckled at Sansa's side. "You have spirit, She-Wolf. I will give you that. More courage than most. A wolf's courage. All the same, take heed and stay out of her way."
Sansa inclined her head in faint acknowledgement, barely listening. It was obvious that the woman-Ygritte-fancied Jon, and he had loved her at one time. Perhaps the sentiments lingered still. Sansa frowned. What did that mean for her? For her plans? She could readily play the whore if it meant yielding the desired results. Yet, her plans held no room for a jilted and spurned lover. Oh well...just another adjustment and recalculation. The game was wrought with them, a true tactician knew how to manipulate and navigate through them.
Besides, Sansa relished at the challenge. She looked on at the flames silently, Muirgayne's warning now a distant, fading memory.
"You're the Wolf-Bitch they have been harping about." Sansa tensed, her shoulders stiffening. She had been praying in front of the weirwood tree, seeking solace and clarity. Though gods only knew why she prayed anymore, it was not as though they had inclined their ears to her entreaties before. Still, she had wanted a reprieve and Jon had given her leave.
Sansa stood, facing the woman, Ygritte. Muirgayne had warned her to take heed of this stranger, that she was no friend of hers and wished her ill. Yet, looking on her now, sizing up her person, Sansa felt no fear, no intimidation. Nothing.
"My name is Sansa." It was such a simple declaration, a mere stating of her name, and yet, looking on Ygritte now, it seemed to unlock a hidden fissure of control and equanimity. She was growing steadily untethered.
"You think he will ever love a Kneeling cunt like you? I know your kind, you Southrone bitches are all the same-taking what is not yours." Sansa stared, patient. It would not do to interrupt.
Let it out, Wildling. Go ahead and place your frustrations on me.
"You forget that I did not have a choice. I did not ask for your precious Wolf to kidnap me from my home. He did that all on his own." Sansa tried not to let her anger consume her, but she could not help it. How long was she to be blamed and made culpable for a crime she had not committed? For each passing second, the anger within her surged and crackled, bubbling just at the surface.
Ygritte stepped closer, then. Her cold eyes raking over Sansa in derision. If one could die by a mere glance, Sansa would have perished a thousand times over from the intensity and weight of her stare. Still, she refused to fold. She raised her chin in defiance.
You are a wolf...now and always.
"He may have kidnapped you, aye, but you want him. You dream about it-him inside you, spilling inside your tight, wet hole. Aye, you want him, but he's not yours to have. He is mine, now and forever. I have killed cunts like you who thought they could have him, stronger and braver than you could ever be. What makes you think I could not kill you now and bury your body somewhere where only the crows could find you?"
Sansa waited, yet beneath her calm equanimity was something sinister, dark. In another life, she supposed, she would have cowered and yielded, begged. Back when her skin was of the finest porcelain. Now, all that remained of her was steel. She was steel.
It was Sansa's turn to step forward, causing the other woman to retreat a few steps, blinking in surprise. Something had changed. Ygritte was suddenly fearful. Since when had the Wolf-Bitch grew fangs?
Sansa dared nearer, still. Already tall, she was made all the more formidable by the cold glint in her eye. If she had moved closer, Ygritte would have sworn to have heard growling.
"You think your idle threats can scare me? Make me tremble? I am Sansa Stark of Winterfell. I am the Wolf's daughter, and you cannot frighten me."